


A Lousy Thing to Be

by stew (julie)



Category: The Professionals (TV 1977)
Genre: Doomed, Gen, Revenge, Undercover Missions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 1991-09-01
Updated: 1991-09-01
Packaged: 2021-03-01 03:49:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,121
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23228905
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/julie/pseuds/stew
Summary: Tommy McKay has been working undercover with the Irish Fight for Freedom group in London. The mission has been an immense success – but there is always a price to pay.
Kudos: 2





	A Lousy Thing to Be

**Author's Note:**

> A prequel to episode 105 _Heroes_.
> 
> **First published:** in the zine “Backtrack” #5 by Joanne Keating in September 1991.

# A Lousy Thing to Be 

♦

Tommy McKay was riding high. The four months he had spent undercover in an IFF terrorist group based in the inner suburbs of London had paid off richly. He had milked all the useful information he could from the local Irish Fight for Freedom members, creating in the process a hefty five-part file for Cowley’s beloved Records, and now CI5 were planning to round up the entire local network the following day. Given that the group’s beliefs started with the idea that the IRA weren’t ruthless enough to succeed in their stated aims, and finished with the notion that violence was the answer to all their problems, Tommy had easily gathered enough dirt to put them all away for a century each. Tommy McKay was feeling very pleased with himself.

He stretched out on the mattress in the grimy bedsit that had been his under the name Patrick Rourke since August. It was now almost Christmas, and bitterly cold with it. Tommy would be well pleased to return to the relative luxury of a CI5 flat with central heating, let alone to regain his identity. 

Undercover as the lone Patrick, Tommy hadn’t even been able to do his Christmas shopping. He had a niece and nephew back in Donegal who would not forgive him if he didn’t make his usual assault on the toy department of Harrod’s. As for his parents and his sister, he’d put a lot of thought into the matter, and decided that it seemed just the right time of year to find them the best eiderdowns money could buy. A CI5 salary couldn’t be called a fortune by any stretch of the imagination, but Tommy had never needed much for himself, and he enjoyed sending parcels back home with excuses usually flimsier than Christmas. 

There was a knock at the door, and Tommy automatically reached for the pistol tucked in beside the mattress. ‘Who is it?’ 

‘Mick – and who else would it be?’ 

‘All right, all right.’ Tommy stood, and shrugged into his coat. This was the last time he’d have to pretend to be Mick’s mate, the last IFF meeting he’d have to attend, the last time he’d have to answer to Patrick. Why ever, he wondered, did he choose his father’s Christian name? Its once-comfortable familiarity was definitely wearing him into impatient contempt. ‘Evening,’ Tommy cheerfully greeted Mick as he stepped out into the hall and locked the door behind him. 

‘Why are you looking so full of yourself?’ Mick asked in mock dismay. 

‘Everything, old son, is coming up roses,’ Tommy declared. 

‘Could have fooled me.’ 

‘Anyway, it’s Christmas.’ Which you’ll be spending behind bars, Tommy added silently and gleefully; now and for many years to come. ‘Crack a smile, Mick, it won’t hurt.’ 

‘Bah humbug, Pat,’ Mick muttered. 

Tommy walked by his side through the streets to the home of one of the local IFF sympathisers, hands deep in his pockets, happily letting the minutes tick by, the bitterly cold air unable to wipe the grin from his face. This festive season promised to be one worth a great deal of celebrating. 

♦

‘Hey, Mr Rourke,’ someone said from behind him, clear in the noisy echo of the Underground. 

Tommy almost dropped his newspaper. He turned and saw a familiar face beside him. ‘Hugh!’ he exclaimed, trying desperately to fall back into his cover. Drawing the man aside, he observed, ‘You weren’t nicked with the rest of them, then.’ 

Thinking he was finished with Patrick Rourke, Tommy hadn’t even prepared for this. All the local IFF members had been arrested the previous day. There shouldn’t have been anyone left to recognise him – Patrick had walked the narrow line of a loner and hadn’t even met Mick’s wife. And now here was Hugh Baker. Tommy had dismissed him as too simple to have even realised what was happening; he’d made the mistake of assuming that if he and everyone else ignored Hugh, then Hugh would respond in kind. 

‘They just asked me a few questions, Mr Rourke. How come you weren’t nicked either?’ the poor sodding half-wit was asking. 

‘I was visiting people out of town,’ Tommy improvised. ‘I didn’t even hear about it all until last night, and now I can’t go home.’ 

‘What are you going to do?’ 

‘Wait until the fuss dies down and head for Dublin.’ Tommy made a show of looking over his shoulder. ‘I’d better get a move on, Hugh. Stay out of trouble!’ 

Tommy walked away, heart drumming high and fast. He’d fooled the man – which wouldn’t have been difficult even under the worst of circumstances. He strode on, confident in the belief that he was truly free of the militant bunch of ratbags and idiots that was the IFF. 

♦

‘Mr Cowley wants you in his office, Tommy.’ 

It was Betty, otherwise the CI5 operative would have told the bearer of such bad tidings what he or she could go and do. ‘I’m just finishing this report, love. Can’t it wait?’ 

‘No.’ She said it quietly, and she didn’t repeat the message. She didn’t even made an amused remark at the idea of Tommy actually _wanting_ to work on a report. Instead, Betty stood there in the doorway and watched him with a strange and wary sympathy. 

‘The Cow knows I want to get this file on the IFF bust tidied up before my Christmas leave,’ Tommy complained by rote. He had the feeling that he was missing something, that he was waiting for the other shoe to drop. ‘What is it?’ he finally asked Betty. 

‘Mr Cowley will tell you.’ For the briefest of moments Betty’s calmness flickered. 

Tommy stood, mind racing. It was obviously important, which meant something to do with the IFF operation. Try as he might, though, he couldn’t think of anything that could have gone wrong at this stage. The raids had been carried out as planned, with interrogations of the prisoners currently proceeding apace. The operation had been a complete success, despite two of the ring-leaders being amongst the five killed during the raids – there had been three gun battles involved, much to Tommy’s annoyance. He’d had to stay back at headquarters so that his cover wasn’t compromised, just when all his meticulous work had come to fruition and the action had started. Tommy would have loved to have been there, shotgun in hand, laughing at the fools who’d trusted him. 

No, Cowley must want him about something really disastrous. Maybe his leave had been cancelled, so that he could do something useless instead, like babysit some rich brat following a kidnapping threat, or run surveillance on an empty house, when all he wanted out of life right now was to escape home to a Donegal Christmas. No, that couldn’t be it – Betty would have been coolly gloating if so, because she was one of the unlucky ones rostered on throughout the silly season. 

Christ, maybe he was going to get the boot. As soon as he’d thought it, his intellect told him that made no sense – how could the Cow sack him after the incredible success of his IFF bust? But this fear had no basis in logic. 

There had only ever been two things in Tommy’s life with any solidity – his family and CI5. He needed them both, and he needed nothing else in the world. His family gave him a form and a context. But CI5 gave that form purpose and resolution, gave him someone to fight alongside rather than fight against. Without CI5, he had hurt himself, hurt all those close to him. Even the army, infamous for providing discipline, hadn’t helped. Before Cowley found him, Tommy had felt that his life was a doomed rollercoaster out of control and plummeting hell-ward in long wild loops. He still couldn’t quite believe that his parents and sister had stuck with him throughout the bad years, couldn’t believe that his niece and nephew’s blind love for him was deserved. None of his friends had been as faithful, that was for sure. Tommy couldn’t understand why some people seemed to value friends above family…

Tommy jolted out of his reflections, casting a glance at Betty by his side. She gave him no more clues. For the life of him, Tommy couldn’t figure it out. The sad smile Betty gave him as they reached Cowley’s office scared Tommy like little else ever had. He let her usher him in and shut the door behind him. 

‘Sit down, Tommy.’ The Scot’s voice was gruff, but there was a hint of the same cool sympathy that Betty had offered him. 

As usual, the operative stood by the filing cabinets, folded his arms and leant his shoulders back against the hard metal. Something was very wrong. Tommy’s sense of danger was clamouring, but he swallowed and asked calmly, ‘What is it?’ 

_All dead._ Tommy stood there, paralysed with incomprehension as Cowley read out a long telegram from the Donegal police and then began to speculate on what had happened. 

Tommy interrupted the monologue after a time. ‘All of them?’ 

‘There were five bodies in the house,’ Cowley patiently repeated himself. ‘Four have been identified by dental records, and they’re working on the last now. But there’s little doubt it’s your sister’s girl.’ 

‘An explosion. Not an accident.’ 

‘It looks like a bomb had been planted. Forensics won’t be sure for a few hours yet.’ 

‘When did it happen?’ 

‘This morning. It took them a while to trace next of kin, but once they realised you were one of mine, they sent all the details they could. Apparently no one’s sure where your sister’s husband is.’ 

‘He did a runner while Cath was still pregnant with their second,’ Tommy said, as if reporting on some routine case. ‘I wouldn’t know where to find him even if l wanted to.’ 

Cowley paused for a moment, studied the taut face before him. ‘I’m sorry, lad, but you’re going to have to work with me on this one.’ 

This morning. So that even as he’d driven through the sleet and braved the hordes of shoppers at lunchtime to buy a few more sparkling decorations for the Christmas tree back home, they were all already dead. Tommy had to clear his throat before he could speak. ‘I’ll kill the bastards,’ he vowed flatly. 

‘We’ll work with the Irish police to see that justice is done,’ Cowley promised in his turn. ‘Think now – was your cover as Patrick Rourke sound?’ 

‘Yes,’ Tommy said absently, shrugging. How could the Cow turn around and talk work so coolly? And then it hit him. _It’s my fault._ ‘The IFF wanted revenge on me.’ 

‘I’m afraid that’s the theory that makes most sense, if they found out you’re CI5.’ 

_‘Sense?’_ Tommy was suddenly overwhelmed by the outrage. _All dead. My fault. How **dare** they? _‘Dear God!’ And the words became a dry wrenching sob of a prayer. ‘Dear God…’ 

Cowley was pressing a tumbler glass into his hands, and Tommy gulped down the neat Scotch gratefully. Anything to try to ease the brutal pain. Anything. _All dead._

But he couldn’t, wouldn’t cry. In moments he was calm again, facing the new and joyless world, every muscle tense and aching with the effort at holding in all the pain. He still had CI5, and CI5 gave him control. ‘Where’s the police report?’ he asked. When Cowley seemed disinclined to give him the telegram, he walked over to the desk, sat in one of the visitor’s chairs, and began to read through it, dully interpreting the codes, taking in the blunt facts of the matter. For all the world as if life went on despite the fact that Tommy was totally lost and hopeless without the context of his family. 

Watching him, Cowley sighed, and put away the bottle of Scotch. 

♦

Betty was sitting at her desk, obviously waiting for him to come out of Cowley’s office. If her eyes were bright, neither she nor Tommy acknowledged that fact. He would have strode past her without a word. 

‘I’m really sorry,’ she said smoothly, stopping him in his tracks. She saw at once that it was useless. Tommy was going to take this one of two ways and, perhaps inevitably, he was walking the hardest and loneliest path. 

‘They’re the ones that’ll be sorry,’ he said grimly. 

‘Tommy, if there’s anything I can –’ 

‘Yeah. Run through Records, see if there’s anything on Hugh Baker. I’ll be back in a few minutes.’ 

‘All right.’ Betty stared after him. When Tommy McKay had first joined CI5 he’d been the only operative she’d thought unpredictable, truly dangerous. The one recruit over whom she’d privately questioned Cowley’s judgement. Despite which, she and Tommy had become something more than acquaintances, something less than friends over the years, even dating occasionally when it was convenient to have a partner for the night. But now Tommy, and the knowledge of what he could become, simply made her afraid – for him, and for the people who had done this to him. 

They might not know it yet, but they had just declared an unholy war. 

♦

Tommy stood and stared, shotgun waiting, held loosely in his hands. He didn’t need it yet, in this long quiet moment. Cowley and Anson were at each side of him, hand-guns cocked and aimed. Tommy stood and stared at Flynn and Mulhall, the two men who had ordered the deaths of his family. 

It hadn’t been too difficult to find them. The IFF were rarely subtle, and the Irish and English police had each had varied, if uncoordinated, information on their members’ identities and locations. When George Cowley had thrown the resources and weight of CI5 into the fight after dealing so effectively with the IFF’s London branch, the terrorist group had soon been demoralised, and then virtually disbanded. Hugh Baker had been of more use to CI5 than Tommy had originally given him credit for, particularly in helping to trace the lines of communication. Then there were all the people from the London group who were already in custody – CI5 were known for their effective interrogations. In the process, Cowley had found a bomb under his car on two separate occasions, and the pub that Anson and Tommy had stayed in one night in Belfast had been riddled with bullets. The miracle was that no one, other than a few determined IFF members, had been hurt. Except, of course, for the Donegal McKays. 

‘Revenge is sweet,’ Tommy intoned. ‘But you know that, don’t you?’ 

‘Five deaths for the five you caused,’ Flynn said. 

‘You asked for what I did to you. My family were innocent of all this!’ 

‘No one who bears witness to injustice, and then does nothing, is innocent.’ 

Cowley interrupted smoothly. ‘You’ll understand if we don’t agree with your notion of justice.’ He glanced at Anson, and the operative moved to handcuff Mulhall. ‘That’s all of them, Tommy,’ the Scot observed, turning away to prowl curiously around the room. 

‘Except for the ones who actually made and planted the bomb,’ Tommy ground out. 

‘As you say,’ Cowley agreed mildly. ‘No doubt these gentlemen will be able to help us with our inquiries.’ 

Tommy cast a glare behind him at his boss. _‘Gentlemen?’_ he queried. 

Movement tugged at the corner of his eye. As Tommy turned again, Flynn caught up a gun from somewhere and brought it to bear on him. The blast of Tommy’s shotgun was loud in the small room. Flynn crumpled to the floor, the bullet from his gun winging harmlessly past the CI5 operative. 

Tommy grinned. That had felt good, very good. Death, without the benefit of the last rites, was what these people, and all those like them, deserved. And Tommy would be quite happy to dispense that justice. He felt Anson’s eyes on him, turned to face the other operative’s frown. ‘They’re killers,’ Tommy said simply. 

‘And he pulled a gun on you,’ Anson allowed. He began to bundle Mulhall out to their car, unnerved by the profane light in Tommy’s eyes. Even if Flynn _hadn’t_ been about to shoot Tommy, Anson would have come close to understanding Tommy shooting him dead. But the look of joy on Tommy’s face – that, Anson couldn’t stomach. 

Cowley knelt over Flynn’s body. Behind him, Tommy stood, externally at ease, internally in turmoil. He didn’t regret what had happened. But the pain, absent for those few moments as he had killed, washed back through him, and he bowed his head before its pervasive power. _All dead. My fault._

♦

‘Who made and who planted the bomb?’ Cowley asked, urbane and tireless, even though he’d repeated the question countless times during the last hour. 

Mulhall didn’t react, might not have even heard. His angry defiance had sustained him only until he’d reached CI5 headquarters. Now he seemed lethargic, uncaring. 

‘Well, if you’re not going to answer me, I have other, more pressing work to attend to,’ Cowley observed. 

This seemingly incongruous remark made the IFF man lift his head to examine Cowley’s bland expression. The CI5 Controller may indeed have been just another civil servant with papers to shuffle before his tea-break. ‘So go do your other work,’ Mulhall invited flatly. 

Cowley stood, ready to go. ‘I’ll leave Tommy here to look after you, then.’ 

There was silence for a long moment as Mulhall regarded the CI5 operative. Tommy looked exactly the same as he had every other time that Mulhall had had the misfortune to be in his presence – ferocious, driven, fey. The only time Tommy had changed expression was as he’d blown Flynn away. Then he’d looked happy for a moment, supremely satisfied. Mulhall didn’t know where Tommy McKay belonged – he wouldn’t have thought the law would want him on their side. Maybe Tommy belonged nowhere, to no one. 

Mulhall closed his eyes, weary. If Cowley was seriously proposing to turn a blind eye, maybe Tommy well and truly belonged to CI5… ‘I’ll talk.’ What was the point of stoicism at this stage anyway? The IFF were finished. There was nothing left to remain faithful to. ‘I’ll talk, damn you!’ 

‘Good,’ Cowley said, sitting again. 

‘It was Flynn who gave the order about your family,’ Mulhall burst out. ‘It’s no use taking that out on me.’ 

‘Tell us who made and planted the bomb,’ Cowley said calmly, ‘and we might listen to the rest of your story.’ 

Tommy’s expression remained the same, neither glad nor disappointed. It didn’t matter how they had reached this point, only that they were here now. 

♦

Cowley poured himself and Tommy a generous nip of Scotch each. He took the glasses to where Tommy sat in one of the visitor’s chairs, and sat himself down in the other. Neither man spoke for a while, and neither paid attention to the eternal bustle of CI5 outside the office. Into the long silence, Cowley said, ‘It hasn’t made any difference to you, has it?’ 

‘No.’ 

‘I thought that, once justice was done, you’d begin to find a little peace.’ 

Tommy’s instincts had told him that, too, but they had obviously been wrong. Tommy now bleakly faced the prospect of life continuing with no respite from the all-encompassing pain. ‘I guess it doesn’t always work that way,’ he offered his boss. 

Cowley paused, undecided until that moment what he was going to do with Tommy McKay. Perhaps no other agency would have taken him off the army’s hands in the first place, let alone kept him now. ‘There’s a war out there. Joe Public likes to think otherwise, and that’s no doubt how ignorant we’d like to keep him. But the war still has to be fought, and we have to force them to fight it on _our_ terms.’ Cowley waited in vain for a response, then leant closer to urge, ‘We don’t have anything to lose anymore, you and I. But we can damn well do something about the people who cause that.’ 

‘They killed me with that bomb,’ Tommy said flatly. ‘I’m a dead man. I just don’t know it yet.’ 

‘Well, lad, come and haunt a few terrorists with me.’ 

Tommy looked across at Cowley. After a while he broke into a grin, though there was only a morbid humour behind it. ‘I’ll be in it,’ he said. ‘If you’ll still have me.’ 

‘Good.’ Cowley stood, wandered back around his desk. He remembered what Tommy’s Commanding Officer in the army had said of the man a few years ago – _‘Frankly, George, we wonder if McKay’s really on our side.’_ The man had been considered for secondment to the SAS, except that he was too unreliable, too dangerous. Cowley said to him now, ‘You’re on my side, Tommy. And I think we’ll win in the end.’ 

‘Of course we will.’ Tommy proposed a toast – ‘Here’s to killing the killers.’ He drained the last of his Scotch. ‘Thanks.’ 

Cowley watched him leave the office, turned to gaze at what little view he had from his blocked-in window. Tommy McKay was on his side, to use as he would. The man might be crazed, might be doomed, but his purpose remained true. And Cowley had seen too many wars to ask for anything else from him. 

But Tommy was one operative, Cowley reflected, who was never going to reach retirement age. 

♦

Tommy had opened the boot of his car to load the reports he was going to review that night, and had got no further, caught in the middle of a curse against paperwork. There was a storm blowing up, and he was alone in the fierce wind, in the crowded carpark below the bleak grey walls and anonymous windows of Whitehall. Tommy stood, unnerved by the blue eiderdowns, the Harrod’s wrapping paper, the doll and its dresses, the Lego sets, the rainbow of coloured pencils, the glitter of tinsel overflowing. 

_All dead._ He slammed the boot shut, stalked back to headquarters, almost threw his CI5 ID at the security guard, took the stairs three at a time. 

He found Betty tidying her desk, ready to go home. ‘You’ve got family, haven’t you?’ Tommy asked, urgent and impatient. 

‘Yes.’ Though perplexed, and worried that it was simply salt in his wounds, she continued, ‘My father. And two brothers, who are married.’ 

‘Children?’ 

‘One of them has three boys. I have a girlfriend who has a daughter –’ 

‘Only for your family.’ _All dead._ ‘Here are my keys. Everything that’s in the boot of my car – take it for them.’ 

Betty seemed to guess what was involved. She frowned, meeting the blue eyes that used to glow at her with irreverent, wry amusement. They now glared at the world, betrayed and ruthless. ‘Tommy, I can’t.’ 

‘It’s the last thing I’ll ever ask of you,’ he said. ‘Take the stuff away. I know it’s too late for Christmas, but I don’t ever want to see any of it again.’ _My fault._ ‘Christ! Throw it all in the garbage if you want, just take it out of my bloody car!’ 

Her face was equal parts sympathy and coolness as she silently took the keys and left the office. 

Tommy took a long breath, glared sightlessly up at the ceiling. So no one approved of him anymore, except possibly Cowley – though even he seemed more understanding than approving. Anson and Betty had found that they couldn’t condone him. The other operatives avoided him. The new recruits looked at him with a blend of fear and disgust and admiration, and spread his story around further, elaborating on it. But what did he care about all that? He still had one of the two important things in his life – CI5. Though the only use he could make of CI5 now was to occupy the time he had left to him. After the IFF had taken his life apart, Tommy McKay had only one small ambition. _Kill the killers._ He would send a few before him, take a few with him. What else could matter? 

Betty returned and gave him his keys, avoiding his gaze. ‘It’s done,’ she said. 

Walking away, Tommy wondered why in God’s name he hadn’t let Flynn shoot him dead. All it would have taken was a slight slip in reaction time, the briefest of pauses, the blink of an eye. And he might have found peace, might have been drawn up despite his sins to be reunited with his family. 

But perhaps God had other plans for him. Perhaps the other deaths he would cause were important. Perhaps the war that Cowley was waging needed one lonely, crazed soldier. Right now, Tommy couldn’t really care. 

_All dead._ Only the pain continued. 

♦


End file.
